Tag: author

Background/Context: According to U.S. Census figures, 11 million elementary and secondary students of immigrant families were enrolled in the public schools in October 2005, representing 20% of all students, and this figure is expected to grow in the coming years. Most of these students enter school as English learners (ELs), and most ELs have exceptionally low performance on measures of academic achievement and attainment. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: This article...

The authors examined whether gender differences in language achievement were related not only to gender differences in attitudes toward schooling but also to the attitudes toward schooling of peers (i.e., peers in classes and in schools). The authors used multilevel analysis on data compiled from a longitudinal research project in secondary education. The primary results revealed that all boys who had negative school-related attitudes were underachievers in language. Furthermore, boys were...

African American adolescents disproportionately perform poorly compared to peers in both behavioral and academic aspects of their educational experience. In this study, African American male students participated in an after-school program involving tutoring, group counseling, and various enrichment activities. All students were assessed regarding their behavioral changes using attendance, discipline referrals, suspensions, and expulsions reports. The Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test (KBIT...

The central concern of this book is the assumption that pedagogical knowledge is generated "outside-in"; that is, from the university, to be applied at schools. The first half of this book provides a thoughtful and thought-provoking conceptual framework for reading and understanding teacher research, exploring its history, potential, and relationship to university-based research. Cochran-Smith and Lytle argue that teacher research can transform, not simply add to, the present knowledge...

The civil rights struggle for equal educational opportunity has yet to be achieved at the start of the 21st century. Inequality persists but problem and remedy are reframed-- from integrating schools, to ensuring equal access in resegregated settings, to closing the petformance. gap. As seen through ecological theory (K S. Weinstein, 2002b), complex, multilayered, and interactive negative self-fulfilling prophecies create or perpetuate educational inequities and unequal outcomes. Society has...

To improve achievement among African American students, education professions must pay special attention to African American male achievement and reframe the academic achievement gap as a treatment gap. Engagement studies suggest that African American students, and African American boys in particular, are susceptible to academic disengagement. Specifically, research (Steele and Aronson 1995; Osborne 1995) suggests that education professionals' "stereotypes about ability" are partly...

Prior research has demonstrated that summer learning rooted in family and community influences widens the achievement gap across social lines, while schooling offsets those family and community influences. In this article, we examine the long-term educational consequences of summer learning differences by family socioeconomic level. Using data from the Baltimore Beginning School Study youth panel, we decompose achievement scores at the start of high school into their developmental...

“Many different methods of calculating disproportionality exist. Each of these methods represents a different way of reporting the same data, and each answers a different question about racial/ethnic representation in special education. This technical assistance guide focuses on two of the more common methods: composition and risk. (The authors) also discuss the risk ratio as a means for comparing risk. This technical assistance guide summarizes how to apply each of these methods...

The achievement gap, traditionally measured by test scores, also can be documented by dropout behavior. Examining dropout behavior among Black, White, and Hispanic students, with a particular focus on gaps within groups and not just between Whites and minorities, shows a clearer picture of the achievement gap. The results of our study show multiple achievement gaps both between and within groups, ultimately concluding that within-group gaps were often more significant than gaps between...

This article examines the effects of neighborhoods and schools on the achievement gaps between adolescents of different nativities and ethnicities. We show that neighborhood and school conditions are better for natives' than for immigrants' children, and they are the worst for Hispanic immigrants. Using cross-classified hierarchical models, we find that introducing neighborhood and school characteristics helps to account for the disadvantage of Mexican immigrants' children but to reveal the...

This article allows readers to look at racial and ethnic disparities in school readiness from a neuroscience perspective. Although researchers have traditionally measured gaps in school readiness using broad achievement tests, they can now assess readiness in terms of more specific brain-based cognitive functions. Three neurocognitive systems--cognitive control, learning and memory, and reading--are essential for success in school. Thanks to recent advances in brain imaging, it is now...

The authors comment on the comments (see records 2005-03019-016; 2005-03019-017; 2005-03019-018) made on their original article entitled <i>On Interpreting Stereotype Threat as Accounting for African American-White Differences on Cognitive Tests</i> (see record 2004-10043-001). The authors welcome the thoughtful insights of Wicherts, Helms, and Cohen and Sherman, and they hope that these comments stimulate further critical analysis of methodological issues associated with stereotype threat...

Presents the opinion of the author about educational achievement gaps in the U.S. Statement that gaps exist because teachers do not believe all children can learn; Her believe that reform rhetoric touts equity as the goal when reform should be the starting point; Motivational speeches; Goals for literacy; Achievement tests; Differences in learning between the rich and poor.

This investigation examined the impact of opportunity to learn content and skills targeted by a writing assessment on the achievement of English learners (ELs), including the potential for differential impact of increased exposure to literary analysis and writing instruction. Results revealed several factors contributing to students' writing performance. Student-level and teacher-level variables were found to significantly contribute to writing performance. Although exposure to writing and...

There is an achievement gap between children from poor family backgrounds and others; this is not unique to the UK, but found in all other countries of the OECD. This article examines the reasons why children from poorer backgrounds do not, on average, do as well academically at school as those from more advantaged backgrounds. It argues that the family, income and material resources are highly significant, although schools also play an important role. Possible implications for policy are...